Though I be formed of clay, And thou of beams[198] More bright than those of day on Eden’s streams, Thine immortality cannot repay With love more warm than mine My love. There is a ray[199] In me, which though forbidden yet to shine, I feel was lighted at thy God’s and mine.[200] It may be hidden long: death and decay Our mother Eve bequeathed us—but my heart Defies it: though this life must pass away, Is that a cause for thee and me to part? · · · · · I can share all things, even immortal sorrow; For thou hast ventured to share life with me, And shall I shrink from thine eternity? No, though the serpent’s sting[201] should pierce me through, And thou thyself wert like the serpent, coil Around me still.[202] And I will smile And curse thee not, but hold Thee in as warm a fold As—but descend and prove A mortal’s love For an immortal.... The apparition of both angels which follows the invocation is, as always, a shining vision of light. _Aholibama_: The clouds from off their pinions flinging As though they bore to-morrow’s light. _Anah_: But if our father see the sight! _Aholibama_: He would but deem it was the moon Rising unto some sorcerer’s tune An hour too soon. · · · · · _Anah_: Lo! They have kindled all the west, Like a returning sunset.... On Ararat’s late secret crest A wild and many colored bow, The remnant of their flashing path, Now shines!... At the sight of this many-colored vision of light, where both women are entirely filled with desire and expectation, Anah makes use of a simile full of presentiment, which suddenly allows us to look down once more into the dismal dark depths, out of which for a moment the terrible animal nature of the mild god of light emerges. “... and now, behold! it hath Returned to night, as rippling foam, Which the leviathan hath lashed From his unfathomable home, When sporting on the face of the calm deep, Subsides soon after he again hath dash’d Down, down to where the ocean’s fountains sleep.”